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Archived News Articles: NMD and Foreign Policy
8/7/2001 from The New York Times:
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/08/05/magazine/05SPACEWARS.html
The Next Battlefield May Be in Outer Space
By JACK HITT
August 5, 2001
" ... Commercial space launches started to outnumber
military ones in 1998. Of the 1,000 active satellites
currently in orbit, about an eighth belong to the U.S.
military, and that percentage will diminish by the end
of the decade, when experts estimate that operating
satellites in space will reach 2,000. ...
America's war planners fear that we could soon lose our
advantage in space. As a result, the military has
commissioned numerous studies and long-range plans, all
of them coming to the same conclusion. Space, the
Pentagon believes, is the ultimate military "high
ground" -- the tower from which to pour boiling oil.
Therefore, America's goal there should be, in the
felicitous phrase used in an early study, "Global
Battlespace Dominance." ...
Last year, the Air Force developed its Strategic Master
Plan for space, which states our goal bluntly: "To
maintain space superiority, we must have the ability to
control the 'high ground' of space. To do so, we must be
able to operate freely in space, deny the use of space
to our adversaries, protect ourselves from attack in and
through space and develop and deploy a N.M.D.
capability." ...
According to the Strategic Master Plan, N.M.D. is but
one part of a triad of technologies -- along with
improved space surveillance and antisatellite offensive
weaponry -- that, the Air Force hopes, will lead to
total "space control." George Friedman, an intelligence
consultant and the author of "The Future of War," calls
the national missile defense plan a "Trojan horse" for
the real issue: the coming weaponization of space. ...
In preparation, space planners have already engaged in
some feverish brainstorming. They envision a high-tech
arsenal that will take full advantage of the military
potential of space, ranging from the near-term possible
to long-term notional: kinetic energy rods, microwave
guns, space-based lasers, pyrotechnic electromagnetic
pulses, holographic decoys, robo-bugs, suppression
clouds, 360-degree helmet-mounted displays, cluster
satellites, oxygen suckers, microsatellites, destructo
swarmbots, to name a few. ... "
8/7/2001 at The Washington Post: On treaties:
http://washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A30322-2001Aug3.html
It Takes Two to Tear It Up
Congress and the President Share the Responsibility
By Walter C. Clemens Jr.
Sunday, August 5, 2001; Page B04
8/7/2001 from Reuters: http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20010807/pl/arms_china_usa_dc_1.html
Visiting Senators Blast China for Arms Sales
By Edwin Chan
Tuesday August 7 10:46 AM ET
SHANGHAI (Reuters) - A visiting U.S. Congressional
delegation blasted China on Tuesday for persisting in
missile sales to countries like Pakistan, saying arms
proliferation remained a key sticking point in Sino-U.S.
relations. ...
Senate Foreign Relations Committee head Joseph Biden
said arms proliferation will be one of the main items on
the agenda when the delegation meets Chinese President
Jiang Zemin, Premier Zhu Rongji and defense minister Chi
Hao-tian at their seaside retreat in Beidaihe on
Wednesday.
Biden is leading the delegation touring Taiwan, China
and South Korea that also includes Tennessee Senator
Fred Thompson and Maryland Senator Paul Sarbanes. ...
Thompson said China's arms sales were a key reason why
the Bush administration is considering a National
Missile Defense System that is envisioned as being able
to shoot down ballistic missiles -- a proposal
vehemently opposed by Beijing. ...
``Our CIA reports continue to say that China is one of
the world's worst proliferators. They've gotten to the
point where they make very few bones ab(o)ut it,''
Thompson said, adding China ranked with Syria, Libya and
North Korea. ...
8/8/2001 from AP:
http://news.excite.com/news/ap/010808/12/int-china-us
China Defends Itself on Missiles
By JOE McDONALD, Associated Press Writer
Updated: Wed, Aug 08 12:42 PM EDT
BEIJING (AP) - President Jiang Zemin told visiting U.S.
senators Wednesday that China has "kept to the letter"
of promises not to export missile technology to Pakistan
and other countries, one of the lawmakers said.
Jiang said China doesn't want to see North Korea develop
a long-range missile capability, said Sen. Joseph Biden,
D-Del., chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations
Committee. ...
Accompanying Biden were fellow senators Paul Sarbanes,
D-Md.; Fred Thompson, R-Tenn.; and Arlen Specter, R-Pa.
...
A Chinese company identified by a U.S. newspaper as the
seller of missile components to Pakistan denied the
allegation Wednesday, the official Xinhua News Agency
said.
China National Machinery and Equipment Import and Export
Corp. insisted it was involved in legitimate engineering
projects, Xinhua said. It said the company described the
reports by the Washington Times as "groundless and a
sheer fabrication." ...
8/9/2001 from AP:
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/ap/20010809/pl/daschle_foreign_4.html
Daschle Speech Criticizes Bush Plan
By DAVID ESPO, AP Special Correspondent
Thursday August 9 2:01 PM ET
WASHINGTON (AP) - President Bush has shown a willingness
to walk away from international agreements backed by
America's allies during his first six months in office,
Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle said Thursday in his
first foreign policy speech since becoming majority leader. ...
8/9/2001 from AP: http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/ap/20010809/wl/japan_nagasaki_anniversary_2.html
Nagasaki Residents Mark Bombing
By ERIC PRIDEAUX, Associated Press Writer
Thursday August 9 1:51 AM ET
TOKYO (AP) - Nagasaki residents paused Thursday to
remember the dropping of an atom bomb that killed as
many as 70,000 people in the world's second nuclear
assault. ...
``The citizens of Nagasaki have continuously struggled
to realize a 21st century free from nuclear weapons,''
Nagasaki Mayor Itcho Ito, an outspoken opponent of
weapons of mass destruction, said in a speech.
``Nevertheless, no fewer than 30,000 nuclear warheads
still exist on our planet, and the nuclear threat is
today on the verge of expanding into space.'' ...
A bomb dropped on Hiroshima three days before the
Nagasaki attack killed about 140,000 people. An
estimated 30,000 to 50,000 people gathered Monday in
Hiroshima to commemorate the Aug. 6, 1945, atomic
bombing there. ...
8/10/2001 from AP:
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/ap/20010809/pl/us_russia_14.html
Russian Doubts U.S. Missile Defense
By PAULINE JELINEK, Associated Press Writer
Thursday August 9 6:40 PM ET
WASHINGTON (AP) - After two days of U.S.-Russia talks at
the Pentagon, the head of Moscow's delegation said he
doubts that America can build even in the distant future
a missile defense system that will work.
Col. Gen. Yuri Baluyevsky spoke to reporters Thursday
about his deliberations, which ended the day before, on
Bush administration proposals to lift treaty
restrictions on missile defenses and reduce U.S. and
Russian nuclear forces.
``In the very distant future, we will not be able to
solve the problems'' of building a system that will work
all the time, Baluyevsky said in a news conference at
the Russian Embassy.
``I am convinced that the future generations will arrive
at a different conclusion, a more simple conclusion'' on
how to defend themselves rather ``than building such a
system,'' he said through an interpreter. ...
8/12/2001 from The Philadelphia Inquirer and The Mercury News: http://inq.philly.com/content/inquirer/2001/08/12/national/MISSILE12.htm
Source: Bush to quit ABM Treaty
Leaving the pact would let the U.S. proceed with missile
tests next year.
By Warren P. Strobel
INQUIRER WASHINGTON BUREAU
http://www0.mercurycenter.com/premium/nation/docs/missiles11.htm
U.S. to renounce ABM pact this year, official says
BY WARREN P. STROBEL
Mercury News Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON -- The Bush administration intends to
announce before the end of the year that it will
withdraw from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty to
pave the way for advanced missile-defense tests in early
2002, a senior administration official has told the
Mercury News. ...
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